June 04, 2003

HEY, MUST BE THE 'MONEY':

HEY, MUST BE THE 'MONEY': My friend, fellow blogger and high school classmate, Jeremy Wahlman, recently went to a book signing hosted by the author of the critically acclaimed new baseball book "Moneyball." Now if you're a regular watcher of ESPN's Sunday night baseball telecasts, or an avid reader of the baseball chat raps on ESPN.com, you're probably thinking right now, "cool! Jeremy met Billy Beane!"
That's because Hall of Famer and ESPN color commentator Joe Morgan has for some reason been under the false impression for the past few weeks that Beane (the general manager of the Oakland A's) is in fact the author of "Moneyball"- and Morgan has seen it fit not only to repeat that incorrect fact everywhere he's gone- but he's also decided to rip Beane at every turn for writing the book that he didn't write.
Anyway, the actual author of "Moneyball" is Michael Lewis (who wrote the book about Beane), and that's who Jeremy met the other night- and Jeremy also had the distinction of being the first person on Lewis' nationwide book tour to mention Morgan's nonsensical bloviating to Lewis- though I would imagine Beane probably heard about it first. And even better, Jeremy was linked to yesterday by the other major pro-"Moneyball"/anti-Morgan blogger, Aaron Gleeman, and had a record hit day.
Billy Beane is not to be confused with Billy Bean, another journeyman outfielder from the late '80s/early 90's, and the first openly gay former major league baseball player. In fact, Billy Bean himself has a new book out, one that he did in fact co-write- so maybe that's what's got Morgan so confused .

Posted by Stephen Silver at June 4, 2003 12:14 PM
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